A student committee made recommendations Friday that, if ratified, will allot more than $145,000 to 13 different campus organizations for the 2012-13 school year and beyond.
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- Weber State University basketball players Kyle Bullinger, Darrin Mahoney and Damian Lillard talk during Saturday’s game against Sacramento State University. The athletic department requested additional funding from student fees to fund a possible NCAA-sanctioned increase in scholarships for basketball players.
The recommendations must first be accepted by each organization and approved by both the student senate and administration before they’re official. They’ll go before the senate next Monday and administration sometime after. Lonald Wishom, a committee member, said the remaining steps before the recommendations are ratified are mainly procedural, and it’s likely to pass without amendment.
Of the $145,911, $116,000 will permanently increase the base budget of organizations. The rest will only be for the 2012-13 school year.
Athletics could be the biggest beneficiary of the recommendations, but the majority of their allocation is contigent on an NCAA decision this Spring.
The NCAA is expected to approve a measure in April which will allow universities to pay their full-scholarship athletes an additional $2,000 for an expense allowance yearly, said WSU President Ann Millner, who sits on the Division 1 Board and the Executive Committee for the NCAA.
Millner said the expected measure is being driven forward by large institutions who argue the current scholarship money available for student athletes isn’t adequate for their needs, or reflective of their contribution to their schools.
Jerreed Ivanich was the only committee member who abstained from voting to approve the increase for athletics, arguing the money could be better spent elsewhere.
The next largest allocation will go toward paying the bill for Utah Transit Authority education passes, which will grow substantially next fall. WSU will be in year two of a three-year contract with the UTA to fund ed passes. In the contract’s first and current year, it cost WSU $471,000. Next year, the bill will be more than $542,ooo, and will grow to more than $624,00 the following year.
WSU would like to split the cost between three different revenue sources. The recommended allocation of $25,000 would mean student fees would cover $146,800 of the bill.
Every organization requesting money received some allocation, but there were a few which, because of budgetary constraints and committee decisions, received only a small fraction of what they requested.
The Sustainability Fund was one of these organizations. The fund didn’t receive any of the $20,000 they requested for base funding. Instead, the committee allotted $9,000 in one time funding for the fund. This makes the Sustainability Fund’s future uncertain. The 2012-13 school year will be the organization’s first year in existence, and it will be forced to operate without a permanent budget.
The decision to allot $9,000 also means the fund’s organizers will have difficult decisions to make with regards to the most effective use of the money. The fund’s organizers want to sponser projects to educate and engage students in sustainability efforts.
Other organizations receiving less than 50 percent of their request are Davis Student Programs and Services, the Health Center and the USA Today Collegiate readership program.
Only three organizations will receive the full amount they requested. These include Multicultural Student Center, Counseling and Psycological Services and Debate. However, of the $4,800 the Multicultural Center will receive, $1,600 will be in one-time funds.
Other organizations receiving one-time funds or an increase in base funding are Campus Recreation, the Customer Service Center, The Nontraditional Student Center and Student Involvement and Leadership.
